The climate crisis we continue to face has sparked global concern, but small steps taken by many communities can have a significant impact in helping mitigate the effects of climate change.
City Utilities of Springfield (CU) provides electricity, natural gas, clean water and other broadband services to the Springfield area. But it’s also offering food for pollinators and host plants for native butterflies. CU has implemented pollinator plots into the land surrounding their solar farm, at 2915 N. Farm Road 209. A pollinator plot is a portion of land that has been cleared of debris and invasive plants. Then native plants are grown, which create a diverse, native habitat for pollinators, like bees and butterflies.
Blake Simmons, supervisor of vegetation management for CU, manages the pollinator plots. He said the two plots at the solar farm span about 15 acres total.
“Primarily for the pollinators it's going to be your native wildflowers, which out here we've got about 30 different varieties,” said Simmons. “But you know, you can come out here and see some coreopsis, some purple coneflower, some rattlesnake master. Things like that are what you got going on out here.”
Pollination plays an important role in our environment, as well as our everyday lives. Pollinators transfer pollen among plants when they feed on nectar. This allows surrounding plants to reproduce and maintain a healthy ecosystem while encouraging plant diversity. Irregular weather patterns and extreme weather from climate change can affect the integrity of a pollinator’s habitat, while also disrupting some pollinators’ migration patterns and accessibility to nectar. Planting native species can help pollinators weather the effects of the changing climate.
Simmons emphasized the importance that pollinators have on agriculture. Pollination plays a crucial role in the production of produce, like fruits, vegetables and nuts. It contributes to the fertilization and seed production of the plants that our produce comes from. Without pollinators, many kinds of fruits, vegetables and nuts would be less widely produced or nonexistent. In turn, this can affect the success of crops, disrupt farmers’ production and lead to food shortages.
A global study done by The University of Florida found that factors of climate change, such as irregular weather patterns and greenhouse gas emissions, are making it more difficult for trees to successfully store carbon. This is known as carbon sequestration, and it's an essential process that improves air quality and soil health and protects ecosystems. A lack of carbon sequestration can cause roots and soil to shift and soil organic matter to decay more quickly, releasing carbon into the air rather than storing it. Large amounts of carbon in the atmosphere trap heat, leading to hotter surface temperatures. A warming atmosphere hinders an ecosystem's ability to store carbon, resulting in what's known as a feedback loop where the amount of carbon being released in the atmosphere can’t be regulated. Simmons said the native plants in the pollinator plots help with carbon sequestration.
“All that root growth. What that equates to is being able to store more carbon, which is good. And then you also get the added benefit of opening up the soil, giving it more air. So whenever it's raining, you're getting a more permeable surface. Water is getting in there. Soil is just the perfect filtration system, so you're getting cleaner water,” he said.
Simmons added that biodiversity is a huge benefit. He said they’ve seen over 60 species of bees in the pollinator plots, and he encourages everyone to consider creating their own native habitat.
“Watershed’s got a great native habitat kind of plant thing down there by the yard waste facility,” he said. “I'd encourage folks to go down there and get some native species and plant yourself a little pollinator plot. You know, it may not be as big as out here, but if you think about it, if everybody had a little 10’X10’ pollinator plot helping the butterflies, helping the bees, it would make a huge difference.”
The Watershed Committee of the Ozarks (Watershed) partners with City Utilities to determine which native plants should be grown in the pollinator plots. It’s a local nonprofit that focuses on sustaining and improving the Springfield-Greene County area’s water resources, but it also operates a native plant nursery.
The Midwest has seen an increase in heavy rainfall and flooding due to the changing climate. These heavy rain events result in more sediment runoff -- when excess rainwater runs over the land rather than soaking into the ground. Toby Dogwiler, a professor of geoscience at Missouri State University, said this allows pollutants to get carried into our waterways. And, he said, the Ozarks region is seeing drought periods in the summer.
“When we have these prolonged periods of dryness, chemicals build up in the soil. They have to be somewhere, so they get flushed into the soil,” Dogwiler said. “And because it doesn't rain for a long time, or maybe we get a few light rains, not enough to really flush anything. And then we get these big intense rainfalls. It flushes all that stuff out of the soil it warrants that ends up in the groundwater in the stream.”
Watershed is an organization that uses both education and effective natural management to maintain clean watersheds across the region. A watershed is a kind of basin– it's the area of land that drains to a body of water. Mike Kromrey, the executive director of Watershed, said that we have several watersheds here, including the Mississippi River, Valley Water Mill Lake, Jordan Creek and James River. The quality of these watersheds determines the quality of our water, including our drinking water.
Kromrey explained that the health of a watershed is the same as the health of the land, and it directly affects the water quality in our streams and reservoirs. He added that the Ozarks is water rich, and the water quality above and below ground are dependent on one another.
“We have wonderful aquifers full of high-quality water -- springs, sinkholes and caves,” he said. “It’s also part of the reason water quality is so important, because anything on the landscape, any water quality issues we have in the landscape, can be reflected in our groundwater as well.”
Kromrey said water quality is directly tied to the land surrounding our riverways, so they use natural methods to try to manipulate the rainfall.
“We try to get the rainwater that falls here to slow down, spread out and soak in,” he said.
A rain garden is a natural technique they use to manipulate the rainwater. Using the quality of the soil, plants and roots in the rain garden, Watershed is able to naturally filter the water and allow more of it to soak into the ground, resulting in something called groundwater recharge. Kromrey explained that the land is like a bank account that needs to be restored or recharged. Watershed has several rain gardens around the community in collaboration with the City of Springfield, and they often use native plants to naturally manage water resources and encourage diversity.
“The more species you have, the more ecological niches are filled, the more resilient that system is,” he said. “And from our lens, the more it can improve water quality.”
Kromrey noted that while climate change is a global issue, Watershed can help people respond locally.
“We work with local producers on the rural and agricultural spectrum to help them do conservation practices that are good for soil and water,” he said.
Implementing these conservation practices can benefit water resources, the aquatic life inhabiting them and local agriculture and economy.
There are ways property owners can implement conservation practices, according to Kromrey. The biggest impact he’s seen from climate change locally is increased flooding. He said the simplest thing someone can do to conserve the quality of a waterway is to have a buffer of trees and plants about 50ft away from the sides of a stream, or a riparian corridor. He noted that having a healthy riparian corridor is more important than ever in light of climate change, and having a buffer of trees and native plants slows down flooding, keeps the water cool and unpolluted and prevents soil erosion.
Watershed’s native plant nursery staff helps people install native plants, whether a business or on a larger scale, like CU’s pollinator plots. Additionally, they work with federal, state and local funds to impact conservation, like doing stream bank stabilization – the process of planting native vegetation to protect streams from sediment runoff and other pollutants. Kromrey added that Fellows Lake is one of Springfield’s main sources for drinking water. Watershed has added floating wetlands –- a floating platform of wetland vegetation that benefits water quality and aquatic life – at the lake, and they also provide information to people who visit.
An important part of what Watershed does is educating the community. They have several educational programs for kindergarten students all the way up to college students, and their goal is to get every student out to the Watershed Center to learn about the Ozarks, according to Kromrey – “making a connection to our beautiful Ozarks so that as they learn and grow, (they) have a basis of knowledge and connection to make choices in their lives that can help water resources.”
